Frontier Developments has lifted the lid on the stunning launch trailer for Elite: Dangerous, the fourth entry in the long-running space combat franchise, ahead of the game’s debut later this week.
Coming off the back of a successful Kickstarter campaign, the studio’s space-faring adventure will be available for $59.99 through Frontier’s online store, where budding explorers will also have the option to pick up the game’s premium Mercenary Edition — which includes an array of digital perks — should they choose to pre-order ahead of time.
Elite: Dangerous kicked up a fuss quite recently when the developing team confirmed plans to remove the offline mode, as the single-player experience would have been “unacceptably limited and static.” In a statement, David Braben — CEO of Frontier Developments — touched upon this backlash, stating that an offline mode was never a planned feature on the game’s Kickstarter page.
Offline was initially not a planned feature when we went to Kickstarter. We said we were making an online game. But then there were some people on forums and on the Kickstarter saying it’d be really great to have offline. So then we looked at it and thought, ‘Actually, why can’t we just run [what we have offline]?’ We looked at the design and saw that it’d be quite empty. And I did say that. But I did say we’d be able to do a purely offline mode.
Frontier Developments will beckon players onto the final frontier when Elite: Dangerous arrives on PC on December 16, with a Mac release confirmed for a later date. In the meantime, you can let us know whether you’re excited to test out Frontier’s latest in the comments below.
